ITF Unions Show Support for ILWU in Grain Dispute

ITF-affiliated unions around the world
are showing support for their colleagues in the ILWU
(International Longshore and Warehouse Union) in what could
be a major labour showdown in the Pacific Northwest of the
USA.

Multinational grain companies who are currently
making record profits have reportedly hired replacement
non-union workers to take over work currently being done by
ILWU members in case of a lockout in the Ports of Seattle,
Tacoma, and Vancouver, Washington, and Portland,
Oregon.

Solidarity with their docker colleagues was nicely
shown this week, when ITF US West Coast coordinator Jeff
Engels boarded the vessel Ramada Queen at United Grain in
Vancouver, and found that the captain and crew were well
aware of the ILWU’s labour dispute, and that they
expressed solidarity with the ILWU on behalf of their own
union, the Japanese Seamen’s Union (JSU).

Jeff Engels
explained: “The captain and seafarers had learned of the
ILWU’s struggle weeks ago, while they were still docked in
Asian ports. As union members themselves, who are among 4.5
million workers united as affiliates of the ITF, they knew
the players involved as well as the high stakes for
workers.”

JSU contracts include an ITF solidarity clause
that its members will honour other unions’ picket lines
(see below). The JSU had informed the ship’s owner of this
clause.

“The crew reiterated that they stand one hundred
percent in solidarity with their brothers and sisters in the
ILWU,” Jeff Engels said.

The ILWU reports that global
grain giants are attacking an 80-year-old collective
bargaining agreement they have had with the union since
1934. Negotiations began in late August 2012 and ended
without a contract in mid-December, with the employer barely
budging from its non-starter, concessionary proposals, which
are said to be seemingly designed to create an impasse. The
members are now working under an imposed
contract.

“Seafarers from around the world are grateful
for the ILWU’s solidarity over the decades,” said
Engels. “They’re eager to have the opportunity to
support the ILWU in their campaign to secure a good contract
with the global grain merchants. They understand that
workers need to stick together, or we’ll all be exploited
by corporations that put profit above the wellbeing of
workers.”

Corporate owners of the six elevators involved
in current negotiations include Japanese powerhouses Mitsui
and Marubeni, Netherlands-based Louis Dreyfus Commodities,
and United States-based Cargill and CHS.

The companies
have hired JR Gettier and Associates, a known strikebreaking
firm, and union longshoremen (dockers) have seen replacement
workers milling about the facilities.

“The global grain
giants control the world’s food supply, and they’re
trying to use that power to break unions, even as they are
making record profits,” said Engels. “The global network
of solidarity among workers provides a counterweight to the
power of these corporations.”

ITF president and chair of
the ITF dockers' section, Paddy Crumlin, said: “When you
sign up to the ITF you sign up to watching out for your
mates. That's what solidarity is, and that's what's built
into everything we do. I am heartened and not surprised to
see this crew spreading that message.

“We don't like
employers who pretend to be interested in negotiation but
reach for union busting strategies instead. That behaviour
has been noticed, and here comes the warning: our friends in
the ILWU can be sure of worldwide support against that type
of behaviour .”

Acting ITF general secretary Steve
Cotton added: “ITF unions are on standby to help their
colleagues in the US. Whether it's on ships or in ports,
workers are watching what happens next and planning
accordingly.”

--

Solidarity clause in ITF
agreements:Article 3.2:
“Where a vessel is in a port where an official trade
dispute involving an ITF-affiliated dock workers’ union is
taking place, neither ship’s crew nor anyone else on board
whether in permanent or temporary employment by the Company
shall be instructed or induced to undergo cargo handling and
other work, traditionally and historically done by members
of that union which would affect the resolution of such a
dispute. The Company will not take any punitive measures
against any seafarer who respects such dockworkers’ trade
dispute and any such lawful act by the Seafarer shall not be
treated as any breach of the Seafarer’s contract of
employment, provided that this act is lawful within the
country it is
taken.”

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